Bullying at schools a mental health concern: Dr Wisani Makhomisane
Onto the story now. On playgrounds, in WhatsApp groups, and in school corridors across South Africa, bullying is leaving devastating emotional scars on children. Long dismissed as quote right of passage, bullying is now an entrenched crisis, one that schools, families, and government can no longer afford to ignore. Member of the South African Society of Psychiatrists, Dr. Wisan Makumisan joins us now via video link for more. Dr. Makumisan, very good evening to you. Thank you so much for joining us. Welcome. [Music] Now, we’ve long referred to bullying as a right of passage, as I’ve just mentioned in the intro, but given what we uh now know about trauma, what does that mindset overlook about the actual psychological scars inflicted on children? Yes, thank you. Uh thank you for having me. Um I think when most of us grew up everyone spoke about that you know uh sticks can break my bones but words could never harm me and I think that to a greater extent has has minimized the damage that bullying comes. Um the bullying that we used to know which is the physical bully bullying where a child will come with bruises or there’ll be bleeding that one is easier to see and it’s easier for whether teachers or parents to come in. It is the psychological one, the name calling, the cyber bullying, the you know minimizing someone, excluding someone that is harder to pick up. And by the time we pick it up, kids have longstanding mental health difficulties, be it anxiety, be it depression, some go as far as suicide, being suicidal. So it is time that we go back to say words heard. M and you know in in communities where violence is often normalized either at home or in society, this desensitization feeds into the perpetuation of cyber bullying as you just mentioned in schools. But how does exposure to bullying then during the formative years of school affect a child’s emotional development and selfworth especially when it’s chronic and normalized by adults and peers? Yes, we actually say bullying harms three people if I’m to put it like that. It harms the victim, it harms the perpetrator, meaning the bully, but it also harms the bystander or the witnesses, the kids that will actually watch this bullying occur. And not to minimize or to to make the bully a a good person, but generally bullies are victims of crime. So you find that the child whether at home or in the neighborhood is a victim of crime is a victim of abuse is a victim of bullying and they feel they do not have any power to stand up. They then go to school where they are with their peers and they use that school environment to be the bully. So I think start to appreciate it from the point where the bully child is a victim and when we but if we say to the bully you are most probably a victim. This is a sign of mental health difficulties on the bully. So come sit with us. Let us look into you whether it’s home or environment or playground back home. Let us look into that to say how do we come in and help you? Because if we only focus on the victims, no one wants to be a victim. Then the victims do not come out and say, “I’m being bullied.” But we have to say to the bully, if anyone enjoys inflicting harm and pain on another person, that person is not okay. And we need to start there to say we deal with the bully, the victim, and the bystander. And especially if left untreated. I mean the untreated schoolyard trauma will definitely manifest in adult mental health disorders such as depression, such as um anxiety or even PTSD. But let let’s talk about where we are today. I mean how would you describe the current climate in South African schools? Are the schools um emotionally safe spaces or are they increasingly becoming sites of psychological violence and learned helplessness? Um we are actually in a it’s an emergency. It’s it’s what is going on in schools is actually quite terrible. You have kids that will shake. You will sit in front of a child who will say I will not go to school. To a point where even when parents say let us change you to another school. They will say but there will be another bully. So our schools and this is both private and and public schools. There is a lot of psychological bullying. There is a lot of cyber bullying. there is a lot of pain and usually you find that it’s one child who’s a victim at home of abuse or bullying but then they become a ring leader and so you have the bystanders or the followers of the ring leader that now become this big group that will bully this child. Now when child A moves schools to go to school B because of of the internet the the bullies from school A will then inform bullies in school B that you know whoever is coming that side. So it’s almost becoming a a little mafia of of small children and this is as low as lower primary school where children are bullied and and to come back and answer your question we have something that we call adverse childhood events which is trauma to a growing brain. So, not only do we deal with anxiety and depression and PTSD, for example, but adverse childhood events have been shown to actually perpetuate or bring forth things like hypertension and diabetes and a whole lot of other cardiac diseases. So, the little playground bully as it would be called actually has devastating problems in future for these kids when they grow. You know, there’s so many faces and elements to this discussion. uh doctor uh but we we out of time unfortunately because especially when it comes to uh the peer silence and bystander culture and how that plays an influence you know in terms of uh the bullying cycle and how we can psychologically shift this culture within schools but thank you so much for joining us we do appreciate your time. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Well that was the member of the South African Society of Psychiatrist Dr. We sign him and it just uh helping us navigate the adverse effects of bullying and how it sort of makes you feel afraid and degraded and often it makes a person feel like they are worthless. I mean in communities where violence is normalized either at home or in society. This desensitization feeds into the perpetuation of bullying at school. The question is how then do we break that intergenerationalized circle?
On playgrounds, in WhatsApp groups, and in school corridors across South Africa, bullying is leaving devastating emotional scars on children.
Long dismissed as a “rite of passage,” bullying is now an entrenched crisis, one that schools, families, and government can no longer afford to ignore.
Member of the South African Society of Psychiatrists, Dr Wisani Makhomisane, joins us for more.
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